American Cities In The 19th Century

The typical American city has gone through quite a few changes in its short history. These changes range from aesthetics to planning to size. Many of these changes then have occurred within the past hundred years. In Joel Garreau’s Edge City, though, he asserts that today’s image of cities is essentially still a nineteenth-century one. For while American cities have come a long way since their founding and first construction in the 1600’s, much of their layout, organization, divisions, and building types remain somewhat similar to the time of their largest transformations in the late nineteenth, early twentieth century. These cities’ forms then were shaped not only by economic and transportation factors, but also by social and aesthetic considerations.
Before looking at how these factors shaped this image of the nineteenth-century city, however, it is important to recognize what exactly characterizes it. The nineteenth-century city structure and form can be broken down into three parts – layout, components, and building types. First, in layout, the city is arranged in a grid formation. Historically speaking, this grid initially allowed for ease of surveying land for new settlement territories. Further, it created a unified survey grid across the country. Today, in many American cities, the grid creates an organized layout, making it easier to navigate from one place to another. At the same time, however, these grids were typically not laid out based on topography. Instead, they were built where necessary. Therefore, some cities like San Francisco still have a grid layout even though they are covered in hills and an ever-changing terrain. Next, in addition to the grid, the nineteenth-century city contains many different components. These include a city center, an efficient public transportation system, pedestrian walkways, parks, and different types of buildings that work together to divide the city and establish a working infrastructure.
One of the most prevalent building types then is the skyscraper. Skyscrapers first became a logical building type in the nineteenth-century city, as railroads caused land values to rise. For example, skyscrapers were built in Chicago in the mid-19th century after an elevated transit loop was built to make the entire downtown accessible by railroad. Land values around this loop then rose as a result, as the area became a much-desired hotspot. Instead of building horizontally then, architects designed vertically to accommodate more people. By building up, cities were able to provide for more people around a focused center. Skyscrapers were then also built across the country in cities such as New York, Boston, and San Francisco. Thus, the nineteenth-century city form consists of many different aspects. But most importantly, it consists of a grid layout, a strategic organization of various components, and countless skyscrapers. This form then was shaped by numerous factors. The Industrial Revolution and different economic factors first shaped the nineteenth-century city by removing the rural focus and turning it towards factories and industry.
In 1850, 85 percent of the U.S. population was rural. Cities were fairly small and the economy revolved around trading. By the turn of the century though, with the help of the Industrial Revolution, cities such as Pittsburgh, New York, and Chicago became powerful and technologically advanced. As a result, Pittsburgh, for example, grew immensely because of its iron ore and steel factories. This industrial and economic advance then created wealth and many jobs for local populations. Thus, these cities started to grow both in size and population, highlighting the first major shift towards the true image of the nineteenth-century city
form. As industry grew, and cities became more populated, transportation came into play and began shaping the city. With new technology came the railroad, a major force in reshaping city layout. As noted before, the creation of the railroad influenced population distribution and ultimately the construction of skyscrapers across the country. These skyscrapers provided more people with access to railroad stations and transportation to the essential outlets within the city. Additionally though, the railroad also played a role in immigrant division within the city. As immigrants flocked to the major cities in America, they typically clustered together in neighborhoods close to their place of work. This assembly then occurred because there were only two forms of travel to work, walking or the railroad. Thus, since many immigrants worked in similar mass-producing industries, they also lived in similar areas either near a railroad stop or within walking distance of the factory. Therefore, the railroad not only influenced architectural change in nineteenth-century cities, but also demographic and social change as well. The railroad, however, was soon overshadowed by the motorized automobile. The introduction of the automobile then had numerous implications for the nineteenth-century American city.
First, it cultivated economic and population growth in certain cities such as Detroit. With jobs paying quite well on the assembly line, Detroit saw migrations come from as far as Eastern Europe, Palestine, and the American Deep South. As a result, production grew and the Motor City quadrupled its population in only twenty years, from 285,000 at the turn of the century to well over a million by 1921. Next, unrelated to the economy or society, the automobile also increased overall congestion in city centers. For, many cities were not originally planned with the automobile in mind, and therefore many could not handle them. While somewhat disruptive to the overall city fabric though, in time, the automobile added to the validity of the city. It provided Americans with a free moving vehicle to and from any desired destination. Working with public transportation and the railroad then, the automobile fostered a form of decentralization within the city. Thus, as people began moving into the suburbs, the automobile still allowed businessmen to commute and work in the core of the
city. As cities became filled with more cars and more people, the overall quality of life went down in the nineteenth-century city. As a result, cities began reacting to these social issues and they forced themselves to begin redeveloping some of the city centers. This redevelopment therefore worked to make certain areas more humane and modern for society. One early example of this type of renewal is New York City’s Rockefeller Center (1931-1939). This business center occupies three blocks with twenty-one high and low buildings that play off of each other. In addition to providing the area with more office space, Rockefeller Center pays attention to pedestrian detail, as it provides pedestrians with a pleasant oasis away from traffic. These pedestrian walkways then include such adornments as rare trees, sculpture, fountains, and flags. This change, along with the changes to other American cities, therefore worked as a reaction to society, to integrate beneficial changes into the nineteenth-century city form. Lastly, aesthetic considerations shaped the nineteenth-century American city form, as parks and new movements influenced planners and architects. One of the more relaxing and escapist components of the American city is the incorporation of greenery and nature. Frederick Law Olmsted played an important role in having these ideas shape cities across the country then. As the interest in landscape parks rose in America, Olmsted called for the integration of recreational parks in an urban setting. One of Olmsted’s most famous urban park designs is New York City’s Central Park. Central Park provided the local population with a beautiful, organized, and aesthetically pleasing retreat nearby. The design consisted of manipulated territory, strategic arranging of rocks, and the creation of meadows. As a result, the area felt natural and rough in comparison to the surrounding urban environment. Based on its location within the heart of an urban metropolis then, the park felt more city and the city felt more park. Thus, the two worked together and in unison to give the city an appealing visual beauty within. By 1902 then, the number of parks in America, and American cities, skyrocketed.
This wave of beautification reshaping in cities did not stop at parks, however. It simply persisted and leaked into architecture and city planning. Here, under the influence of the City Beautiful movement, also led in part by Olmsted, cities began to see a new type of attractiveness. In particular, this movement called for strong axes, greenery, coordinating building principles, and overall harmony in building organization. For example, Washington D.C. saw a restructuring of the National Mall, with dense lines of elm trees and a powerful axis connecting the Capitol building and the Lincoln Memorial. This movement then influenced numerous other cities to change their architectural approach to buildings and planning as well. In turn, plans became a civic interest, as opposed to being made privately by speculators. Thus, as seen through the numerous influences of Frederick Law Olmsted, aesthetics and city beauty played an important role in shaping the nineteenth-century American city form known today.
Overall then, the image of today’s American cities is truly very close to that of a nineteenth-century one. For these cities were shaped not only by economic and transportation factors, including the automobile, but also by social and aesthetic considerations. These influences thus create the form for the larger city. They give meaning and origin stories to cities’ layout, internal components, and most important building types. They provide explanations for certain decisions. And they provide the planners of today with templates to work off of for the future. At the same time, however, while these cities remain fairly stagnant and classic, others rise on their outskirts. Here, edge cities begin to thrive and grow in a new time and a new age. These edge cities then grow under different constraints than traditional downtown cities and pave the way for a changing future.